Hospital youth cribs or pediatric cribs are well known in the art. Each consists of four (4) vertical end frame members. The members are connected in a rectangular arrangement. A head frame or a foot frame is formed by each pair of vertical end frame members. A plurality of vertical rungs extend between upper and lower horizontal frame members. A pair of gatches is attached to each frame and runs to the opposite frame forming the crib sides. A side gate having a frame and a plurality of similar vertical rungs is positioned between each frame just outside each gatch. A crib floor, parallel to the ground, is supported by each frame member. Typically, wheels are attached to the base of each vertical member to provide mobility of the hospital youth crib.
In order to easily gain access to the interior of the crib, at least one of the side gates is moveable. A pair of tracks is attached to an adjacent pair of vertical frame members and the sides of the gate frame are positioned within the pair of tracks. The moveable side gate can then be lowered below the crib floor to allow for easy ingress and egress of a child patient. Furthermore, a lowered side gate provides medical personnel with easy access to the child patient. A side gate for a hospital youth crib weighs approximately 18 pounds. Due to this weight, it is often burdensome for medical personnel to lift the crib side gate into its closed position, especially when trying to keep a young patient from attempting to get out of the crib before the side gate is fully raised. Such attempts by children often require the nurse or medical personnel to keep one hand on the child restraining his or her movements. This leaves only one hand free to raise the crib side gate. Even if the child does not need to be restrained, one hand may be required to keep tubing, electrical wires, and other medical equipment from being caught in the crib side gate track while raising the crib side gate. Again, only one hand is free to raise the side gate. When opening or lowering the side gate, if the nurse is unaware of its weight or loses his or her grip, the side gate may drop too quickly and abruptly bottom out at the end of the track.
In the above noted situations, as well as many others, a "weightless" side gate has many advantages. The operator of the gate is not easily thrown off balance by the weight of the gate increasing his or her chances of falling onto the crib, accidentally removing medical apparatus, or otherwise endangering the safety of the child patient. Furthermore undue stress or strain is not imparted on the operator's back when attempting to lift the heavy gate. If the operator were to loose his or her grip while closing the side gate, the gate of this invention will not fall to the bottom of the track stopping abruptly at the track end.
Because the side gate is moveable and can be raised and lowered with minimal effort, the "weightless" side gate of this invention is provided with a latch mechanism that cannot operated by a child but, in light of the foregoing provisions for single hand operation, can be easily activated by an adult using only one hand. The latch requires a sequential compound hand motion to disengage the latching means so that the gate can be raised or lowered.
One of the objects of the present invention is to provide a hospital youth crib with a "weightless" gate that can be raised and lowered for ingress and egress of a child patient. Another object of the present invention is to provide a novel way of attaching a pair of spring powered reels to at least one side gate of a hospital youth crib so that the side gate becomes essentially weightless. Another object is to provide the hospital youth crib with a novel side gate latch mechanism requiring a single hand sequential compound motion on the part of an adult in order to release the gate from its locked position. By design, the latch mechanism cannot be operated by a child even if the child uses both hands. These and other objects of the invention will become apparent in the descriptions herein.